10 Wacky Biblical Conspiracy Theories

Weâ€™re guessing youâ€™ve heard of the Bible. The founding text of a little something known as Christianity, it sets out the guiding principles of Jesusâ€™s teachings, offers advice for life, and gives the craziest people on the internet something else to project their madness onto. And it turns out that for every regular Christian drawing inspiration from the Bible, there are tons of lunatics using it to turn their collective insanity up to 11. Here are 10 Biblical conspiracy theories so flat-out bizarre theyâ€™d make Dan Brown weep.

10 God Owns An Awesome Spaceship

The book of Ezekiel is kind of a big deal in Biblical lore. Not only is it frequently cited by the most badass Christian in history, itâ€™s also home to some breathlessly poetic descriptions of awe-inspiring visions. One in particular, in Ezekiel 1, represents one of the most remarkable moments in the Bible outside of Revelations—a grand passage that overwhelms the reader with the magnificence of God and all his power. That is, unless you happen to believe in conspiracy theories, in which case it overwhelms them with a big flying spaceship.

The scene starts with the narrator in exile, just chilling by the riverside, when suddenly the heavens open and a frightening contraption descends—a monstrous thing of â€śwheels within wheelsâ€ť and lots of fire. Since this doesnâ€™t sound exactly Biblical, proponents of the ancient astronaut theory have frequently jumped on this as a description of a spaceship from someone who didnâ€™t have the vocabulary to describe one.

All of which sounds pretty convincing, until you actually read Ezekiel 1 and discover that heâ€™s quite accurately describing a chair. Specifically, the throne of God, which is described in the exact same way elsewhere without any references to flying or fire or anything thatâ€™d make you automatically think “spaceship!”

9 The Tower of Babel Was A WMD

We all know the story of the Tower of Babel—a gigantic structure built by man in an attempt to reach the heavens. But there are some who believe it was actually a rocket-mounted hydrogen bomb designed by Nimrod to destroy any meteorites God threw at them via his city-sized Stargate.

Just to be clear, this isnâ€™t a wacko theory posited by a single nutjob. It appears in various forms on a number of blogs across the Internet, and always involves the same basic mish-mash of ideas. The first is that ancient beings had left behind a pile of super-mega missiles that humanity stumbled across and decided to use; the second is that they planned to use it to attack God (for varying reasons); and the third is that heaven confused their languages to stop them from attacking. In short, itâ€™s simply a reprise of the original story that adds nothing of value except sexing it up to include a massive H-Bomb.

If anything, it probably detracts from the original, because while building an impossible tower is a nice metaphor for humanityâ€™s hubris, accidentally stumbling across a city-vaporizing bomb from the future isnâ€™t a metaphor for, well, anything.

8 Jesus Called Barack Obama ‘Satan’

Itâ€™s no secret that Obama isnâ€™t exactly the most popular president in history. Too warmongering for lefties and too socialist for those on the right, heâ€™s clearly got a few problems. The biggest of these may be that Jesus once openly referred to him as Satan.

Itâ€™s true: Luke 10:18 in full reads â€śAnd he said unto them, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven.â€ť Now, if you incorrectly translate that sentence into Hebrew, the words â€ślightningâ€ť and â€śheavenâ€ť become Barq and Bamah (or Shamayim if you do it correctly). Say them fast enough and it sounds like â€śBarak Bamah.â€ť And that in turn sounds like â€śBarack Obamaâ€ť—meaning Jesus just heavily implied that the 44th President of the United States is literally Satan.

At least he did if you completely ignore the other words in the sentence, the ones that come between â€ślightningâ€ť and â€śheaven.” And if you mistranslate â€śheaven.â€ť And if you ignore the â€śOâ€ť at the start of â€śObama,â€ť and ignore the fact that taking any two random words and translating them into Hebrew will probably result in something that sounds a little bit like something else. But hey, donâ€™t let that get in the way of your belief.

7 The Bible Is A Computer Program

Looking for patterns in the Bible is nothing new. Ancient scholars did it. Isaac Newton did it. Dan Brown made millions doing it (sort of). So what could possibly be crazier than a bunch of guys using computers to analyze random Bible words for clues to the future? Well, how about a bunch of random guys using computers to prove that the Bible is secretly an ancient computer program?

That last link, by the way, will take you to a website so overloaded with insanity thereâ€™s a very real chance itâ€™ll crash either your mind or computer (or both). The idea it puts forward is that there is a mathematical code embedded in the original Hebrew of the Bible that was encoded with a â€śtime lockâ€ť to stop people from opening it until the late 20th century, and that whoever cracks that code will have the key to unlocking the cryptogram of the universe. In other words: The universe is a giant computer and the Bible is the ancient program that will give us absolute control over it, something that was conspicuously used as a plot point in the ’90s thriller The Omega Code.

So how do we go about using this super-powered program? Well, according to the website above, things are already in motion. Theyâ€™ve been looking through the Bible for clues, and by their calculations, the code should be cracked sometime around the year . . . 2006.

6 Sodom And Gomorrah Were Destroyed By A Nuclear Bomb

The story of Sodom and Gomorrah is a contentious one to say the least. Depending on whether youâ€™ve bothered to read Ezekiel 16:49-50, itâ€™s either about God blowing up a city for refusing to help the poor and needy, or (if you havenâ€™t) because he really, really hates gay people. On the other hand, it could just be about a city wiped out in an ancient nuclear attack.

The idea goes that some ancient aliens were in the middle of civil war when one side decided to unleash nuclear death on the other. Lot—the sole survivor of the Bibleâ€™s most infamous conflagration—was an alien spy saved when his masters told him to leave the strike zone. His wife was turned to salt by the force of the blast and the resultant fallout explains both the Dead Sea and the general aridity of the region. Itâ€™s such a neat little theory that you almost want to believe it—until you realize it makes absolutely no sense.

5 Jesus Invented The Internet

Ask anyone on the Internet today who was responsible for inventing it and theyâ€™ll (rightly) answer â€śAl Gore.â€ť But it turns out that the former Vice President was stretching the truth a little bit more than we thought when he made that claim. According to a number of theories out there, the first person to actually dream up the Internet was none other than Jesus.

Now, since most of us probably don’t remember from Sunday school the scene where Jesus was forced to invent both computers and telecommunications before tackling the Internet, weâ€™d better back up and explain. The idea isnâ€™t that Jesus literally built the Internet—that would be silly—but that he predicted it with unerring accuracy, sort of like how people give Jules Verne and H.G. Wells credit for â€śinventingâ€ť stuff they dreamed up for their books.

Itâ€™s all thanks to the Parable of the Net,a fisherman-based story in Matthew that functions as an allegory for the Final Judgement, but is actually predicting the Internet—because â€śthe netâ€ť is 1990s slang for â€śthe Internet.â€ť Honestly, thatâ€™s about as much rationale as these people give, although there are some interesting attempts out there to prove how a man from ancient Galilee talking about fishing is really describing modern broadband. Weâ€™ll let you have a read and decide for yourselves.

4 The Bible Contains Evidence Of Time Travel

Time travel is one of those things we all so desperately want to be real that weâ€™ll look for evidence of it anywhere. And you better believe that includes the Bible. A year or so ago, the conspiracy TV show Ancient Aliens even devoted a whole segment of its show to “proving” that the prophet Jeremiah had witnessed an incident of time travel.

But this is a far from the delusions of a lone nut: Across the Internet, endless videos and pages exist claiming the Bible not only describes time travel, it also shows you how to abuse it. That last link in particular will take you to a site that seems to claim God both invented time travel and then gave the power to Hitler, specifically so he could go back to the pioneer days and murder early white settlers (because we all know how much Hitler hated white people). Sure it doesnâ€™t make any sense, but thatâ€™s the beauty of conspiracy theories: They don’t have to.

3 Noah Came From Mars

Thanks to the absolute lack of evidence to support the idea of a globe-destroying super-flood, itâ€™s already pretty niche to believe that the Genesis account of Noah is anything but an awesome myth. But niche doesnâ€™t even begin to describe the guys in this entry. See, not only do they believe that the story of Noah literally happened, they believe it literally happened on Mars.

Although the theory has many variations, the basic idea seems to be that a cataclysm threatened Mars—like, for example, a planet-destroying flood—that forced Martian leader Noah to escape in a spaceship containing a handful of Martian animals and plants, which he later used to colonize the Earth. In some versions this involves genetic manipulation, in others it simply involves landing on another planet and gallivanting about like some sort of bearded Xenu. In other words, itâ€™s an insane hodgepodge of nonsense disguised as some sort of sci-fi fairytale. Kind of like Scientology, when you think about it.

2 The Garden Of Eden Is Hidden Under Kansas City (And Inhabited By Nazis)

People have wasted a lot of time and energy trying to find the location of the Garden of Eden. Wasted because, A) it probably doesnâ€™t exist in a literal sense, and B) if it does, itâ€™s guarded by an immortal being wielding a sword of fire. Oh, and also because itâ€™s already been discovered—1,200 kilometers (800 mi) below Jackson County, Missouri.

Well, at least according to this theory, which also states that itâ€™s currently inhabited by aliens and members of the Nazi party. The idea is an offshoot of the Hollow Earth theory weâ€™ve covered elsewhere, combined with a load of Christian imagery, UFO lore, and seemingly anything else that occurred to the author during a late-night drinking session.

In essence, itâ€™s like the perfect mix of conspiracy theories: a load of self-contradictory nonsense that flies in the face of both established science and established Bible scholarship. The only thing it lacks is the assertion that a leading Biblical character is some sort of weird space alien.

1 Jesus Was A Space Monster

The main problem with the ancient astronaut theory is that once you start applying it to the Bible, it leads to only one outcome: that Jesus Christ—historical religious leader, Son of God, and meddlesome End Times prophet—was a human-alien hybrid placed on Earth by intergalactic warlords to freak us out with futuristic technology.

You can probably guess the idea behind this one. The virgin birth was a genetic implant. The “miracles” of Jesus were simply alien tech (weâ€™re intrigued to hear how this explains the miracle of the pigs; feel free to suggest ideas below). The missing 30 years of Jesusâ€™s life were spent on the mothership, learning how to manipulate humans. All so he could . . . what, exactly? Start a religion? Get crucified? Hang out with Mary Magdalene and get up to some hijinks while he was at it?

However you look at it, the â€śJesus was an alien hybridâ€ť theory doesnâ€™t even begin to tiptoe around the edges of making sense—all it does is take one unexplainable mystery and replace it with a load of pseudoscience dressed up with inexplicable scenes of sci-fi insanity. Sure, itâ€™s essentially harmless, but that fact that people genuinely believe this is somehow terrifying.

Morris is a freelance writer and newly-qualified teacher, still naively hoping to make a difference in his students' lives. You can send your helpful and less-than-helpful comments to his email, or visit some of the other websites that inexplicably hire him.